Whiskey Witches by F.J. Blooding (mobile ebook reader txt) 📕
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She stared at him with vacant eyes. “How do you live like this?” Her eyes closed and her head fell back slightly as tears studded her eyelashes. “There’s nothing. I feel…nothing.”
“You’re lying, Pea. You’re feeling more than you can handle right now.” He’d lost a brother. She’d had her daughter ripped away from her and years erased from her life. How could he compare the two? “It gets…better.”
“Just do the job.”
“Yeah,” he said. “You just do the job.”
She opened her flooded, chocolate eyes.
He tipped his head at her apologetically. “I know there isn’t much I can do, but if you need to talk…” He shrugged with his hands deep enough in his pockets to keep himself from grabbing hold of her again.
An almost visible wall slammed across her features as she brushed past him. “We’re dealing with a killer trying to raise a demon.”
He almost wished she’d go back to the weepy Paige. A thread of fear wormed through him. Whiskey women were crazy scary when they put those walls over their emotions. “Mostly, I think they’re after you.”
“To raise a demon.”
He followed her to the table and pulled out the wooden chair. “Your gift, you know, talking to demons and stuff, do you know how to use it?”
She gave him a deadly serious look.
He raised his hands in surrender. “Then maybe you know which demon they’re trying to raise now that you remember and all.”
“I’ve got a pretty good idea, but we all thought he was dead.”
“How dead? Like bounced back to Hell kind of dead, or dead like you’re never going to return kind of dead?”
“Even demons have souls, Dexx, in fact, they are souls. Angels are too. ” Paige knelt beside her bag lying on the floor and dug through it. “I’m pretty sure his soul came back somehow. Reborn somewhere.”
“Rebirth,” he said, blinking at her in disbelief. “A demon. You’re serious.”
She walked to the dresser with a black candle and an incense burner. “I can’t be positive, but it would make sense. If we’re reborn, why can’t demons be?”
“What would that look like exactly?” Unease burned through Dexx’s gut as the black candle stared at him from across the room. He knew black candles could be used to bring about good magick, but it could also bring about the bad. He wasn’t a complete fool. “Would he come back as a serial killer? Are we looking at this all wrong?”
“No. We’re not. Demons aren’t what you think. They’re not what the Bible and the Koran tells us they are. Not entirely anyway. They’re fighting for us.” Her matter-of-fact tone grew gravelly. “Unlike the angels.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I think you need to seriously get your head realigned, Pea. I’ve seen demons. I’ve dealt with them. They’re bad news.”
“You don’t understand them.” She lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “And why would you? You see a demon and the only thing you think is to get rid of them. Like Hitler with the Jews.”
“Jesus, Paige. I’m a demon hunter and trust me. Demons aren’t soft, go-to-work Jews. They’re not living, breathing humans. A demon? Demons want to wreak havoc. They think nothing about killing innocent people.”
She snorted. “Innocent people. Is there such a thing?’
“Don’t let Rachel taint you.”
“Too late.”
“Pea, don’t go like this. There must be some part of you that sees how wrong this line of thinking is.”
She shook her head, catching his gaze in the mirror. “Why would I see that? When we’re born, we’re guaranteed one thing in life. Just one. Death. Why would we hide from that? Why would we fear it?”
“Because we were also given life.” He took a step toward her. “And that’s worth fighting for.”
“Maybe yours is.”
His eyebrows leapt into his hairline. “Yours is, too.”
She narrowed her gaze as she dropped it to the candle. “Then why is there a hole in my soul?”
“We talked about that.”
She flattened her lips then smiled slightly.
Shit.
“Yes. It’ll get better, you said. Concentrate on the job, you said.”
“I won’t lie here. It’s real hard for a while, But don’t side with the demons. Did I miss saying that part?”
“They’re trying to build us stronger, to make us better able to accept the responsibilities of life.”
He sucked the corners of his mouth together, his jaw wide, making a popping sound as he released them. “They’re regular saviors.”
She watched his reflection. “What are you doing here, Dexx?”
“Keeping an eye on you,” he said with a little more anger than he probably should have. “Your head’s not exactly in the right game here, Pea.”
She spun on him. “Where is it exactly, do you think?”
Alarms rang in the back of his head. He ignored them. “I don’t know, but you’re getting dangerous. Let’s talk about this, get you back to normal.”
“Let’s talk about normal, shall we.” Her voice low and dangerous as she stalked toward him like a wolf. “My mother took away my child. Why? To protect my daughter from my gift. Hell, for that matter, my sister moved out of the house to protect her daughter. And my grandmother? What did she do? She told me to stop using my gift. But do you know what I do with it?”
He took a half step backwards. “Summon demons?”
“I watch them. I call them when they’re needed and I send them back when they’re not.” She lowered her voice to a bare murmur. “I protect the human race from the things that are hell bent on ‘saving’ them, and they took my daughter.”
“Paige.” Dexx reached out a hand, not knowing what he planned to do with it.
“And after Leah—” She closed her eyes and turned away, silent for a moment. “And then they took her from me, instead of helping me—”
Dexx bit his lip in the ensuing silence. “Yeah, about that. I told them to stop. So, don’t go sending any demons after me, all right?”
Paige’s face lost all color as a sickly smile slithered onto her face. She straightened. Her shoulders slid back. Her neck lengthened slightly as she marched to the dresser.
The candle shot alive with flame.
Holy fuck!
A tendril of smoke rose from the flame, permeating the room with a heady, earthy scent. Sandalwood.
“Pea.” Dexx searched for his bag of demon-killing gear without moving. He did not want to tip her off and force her hand. “What are you doing?”
“Summoning.”
Dexx launched himself at his bag, then dumped the contents on the bed. He grabbed a knife.
In her reflection, the brown of her eyes receded to a near total black, her eyes fully dilated. “Balnore, I need you.”
Dexx grabbed his sawed-off shotgun—which was absolutely useless but might buy a few seconds to do…something—and his dagger consecrated in holy water.
A cloud of smoke formed in the middle of the room as the demon took the shape of a man. He had black hair feathered back from his soft, boyish face, but his stance held power. His blue, button-up shirt was open and loose.
Dexx raised his shotgun with one hand, his lips flat. Balnore. He’d seen the demon around back in Texas before everything had gone to shit. While he’d never seen this demon actually do anything bad, he did have Paige’s ear. She trusted him. It. Whatever. Maybe this demon was the reason Paige had decided to summon demons to kill her mother in the first place.
Or, maybe, Rachel was the reason Paige had tried to kill her.
The demon studied Dexx, a slight frown furrowing across his brow. “Peanut? Why is Dexx Colt in your room? You do remember he’s a demon hunter, right?”
“You know him?” she asked. Her eyes had returned to normal again, at some point.
“He’s a reputable demon hunter,” Balnore said, his tone inferring that it should have occurred to her. “I didn’t piss you off when you dream-called, did I?”
Dexx stepped forward. “Stop where—”
“I really don’t have the patience for you.” Balnore swept his hand nonchalantly.
Dexx raised one sigil-protected arm to deflect the demon magick, and stood his ground. The sigil took the brunt of the blow, but Balnore’s magick was strong and came at him like a hammer.
The demon quirked an impressed eyebrow at him. “Seriously, Peanut, what is he doing here? Did you call him, or did your family?”
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